Someday
by Mowee
Summary: Laigle and Joly on the barricade.


**Someday  
**by Mori

"Down! Get down!" 

The voice was urgent, so I complied without a thought. A moment later, something shot past my head, leaving a strange tingling in my scalp. An anguished cry from behind informed me that another man, not far off, had not been as fortunate. I got on my hands and knees, shuffling backward, and felt his wrist for a pulse. There was none. Letting it drop with a grimace, I took his small amount of ammunition and returned to my post. 

Without rising, I glanced around myself, tense with alertness - their faces were white, contrasting sharply with the scarlet blood that smeared nearly all of them. A few of those faces were cracked in nervous, distracted smiles. They spoke to one another in low voices, making light of the situation, unable to do more. And how else could we keep up our strength? 

There was a scuffling sound above the place where I knelt, and I turned my head up in time to shoot down a National Guard who had been perched at the top of the barricade. 

A loud sneeze drew my attention to the man at my right. 

"The air reeks of gudpowder. Gunpowder," he was saying, as his hand darted to his pocket for a handkerchief. 

"Good that it stopped raining anyway," I replied, reloading my musket. 

"Certainly." 

My companion had been cheerful as usual, up until a few moments ago, when the battle had burst into flames. It was a vicious struggle, and even natural habit was forced to step aside to make way for concentration and willpower. There were several moments when I realized I hadn't been breathing. With every second that passed, I wondered when my luck would fail me - as it invariably did - and _I _would be the onewho cradled a bullet in my heart; whose blood painted the barricade. 

"Joly, to your right!" 

It was all passing like a dream to me, as if I was looking through the eyes of someone else. I moved completely by instinct; firing, reloading, ducking, scampering from one place to another. But through it all, there was a constant, pleasant sniffle in my right ear, and a flash of white fabric in the corner of my eye, amid the blur of weaponry. If I was at all troubled or afraid, those two simple things were what kept me level-headed. 

"When we get out of this" 

It was shortly after those words were spoken - and interrupted - that I noticed the fabric was tinted red, and the sniffle was replaced by a sort of wheezing, laboured breath. I had not fully awoken from my trance-like state until I heard the clatter of a carbine against stone, and the thud of a body slumping to the ground. And yet, I did not believe it. 

"Of course," I muttered, not knowing the words that I spoke, "the irony. That you would die before I did" All thoughts of liberty, equality, and fraternity fled from my mind as I flung aside my musket, dropping to my knees to shake him. "Joly!Joly!" But I knew that my efforts to wake him were in vain. _When we get out of this_ what, Joly? What then? My words dripping with bitterness, I cried, "You damned fool! Who will I room with when this is over?!" But words failed me then, and for the first time in my life, my throat was clenched with the onslaught of tears. I almost felt myself sinking into regret - a regret of ever having gotten mixed up in this, ever having gone this far. Whether I survived or not, I was dead; Laigle de Meaux was nothing without Joly. 

I took his hand tenderly into mine, shuddering at how cold it was. For the moment, I was deaf to the sounds of battle, and all I saw was that pallid hand, drenched in slick blood. I did nothing for what seemed like hours - in reality, it was but a couple of seconds - but clutch that limp hand, hoping it would move, perhaps even squeeze me back. 

Then, as if draining the hypochondriac of his last strains of life, I took a shuddering breath and reproached myself, pulling out of the depths of despair. _No, this is not about yourself. We vowed to fight to the death. This is no more than we asked for. _Reaching out a trembling hand, I closed Joly's eyelids. _There is still the Cause._

Kissing Joly's hand and letting it fall, I lifted my musket, alive once again. Hardly had I risen, than a sharp pain exploded in my stomach. I doubled over, blinking stupidly, unable to utter a sound, and looked down, unprepared for what I saw: a bloodstained bayonet protruding from my abdomen. _Oh God_ The bayonet receded, and a sickening pain shot through my body. My hands were clutching at my stomach, and I was only vaguely aware of the deep gashes in my palms. Feeling that I might retch, but unable to, I lowered myself to the ground only to be brought up short a second later, as the bayonet struck once more. 

My vision darkening, I realized that I was laying side by side with my dear friend, coughing blood into his hair. _When we get out of this, Joly_


End file.
